Taking In the Sites; Kyoto? Rio? Al Gore? Cyberviews of the Eco-Fatigued

Many of the believers in global warming were in Kyoto, Japan, last week. Many of the skeptics were on line.

As the nations of the world gathered to figure out how to save the planet from the various ills attributed to man-made greenhouse gases, environmental doubters were trying to figure how to convince people that all the concern is a lot of, well, hot air.

And like many other contrarians these days, the foes of environmental correctness have made a home on the Internet. Judging by all the furious debunking going on in cyberspace last week, there are more than a few people who think that most environmental regulation, Vice President Al Gore's claims to environmental credentials, and the Rio Declaration on global warming are little more than symptoms of a global hysteria that could bring down the global economy.

Following the Rio Declaration, agreed to in a sultry climate, the foes of environmental correctness chose to issue their own global warming manifesto from a cooler clime -- Leipzig, Germany. The 1995 Leipzig Declaration is a cornerstone of the World Wide Web site run by the Science and Environmental Policy Project, which is a project of S. Fred Singer, ''one of the nation's pre-eminent authorities on energy and environmental issues,'' and a staff member at the Environmental Protection Agency during Richard M. Nixon's first Administration.

''Historically, climate has always been a factor in human affairs,'' it says, ''with warmer periods, such as the medieval 'climate optimum,' playing an important role in economic expansion and in the welfare of nations that depend primarily on agriculture. Colder periods have caused crop failures, and led to famines, disease and other documented human misery.''

The site reports that the latest signers of this declaration were a group of television weather forecasters. They could presumably have been among those worried that, as reported at the Web site of Citizens for a Sound Economy, roughly 4.9 million jobs could be jeopardized by regulatory measures being considered to curb global warming.

But there is no need to go hunting for obscure network addresses to find environmental skeptics on line. Take Globalwarming.org, for instance, the easily remembered address for the Web page run by the Cooler Heads Coalition.

The Cooler Heads are members of a group established by the National Consumer Coalition, which is backed by a panoply of conservative and libertarian advocacy groups.

Tucked among the Cooler Heads' wealth of information are suggestions from a book called ''Facts, Not Fear'' on how to educate children about the environment.

''Explain to them that at the time dinosaurs lived, the atmosphere had CO2 levels that were at least five times greater than what we now have,'' the site says, using the scientific shorthand for carbon dioxide, the gas some scientists say helps cause global warming, ''and that these high levels of CO2 contributed to the rich vegetation.''

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Serious science is also the theme at the Web site of the Advancement of Sound Science Coalition, called the Junk Science Home Page.

The motto of the page is ''All the junk that's fit to debunk,'' and it includes an essay that reads:

''As far as agriculture is concerned, a modest warming is bound to be beneficial for several reasons. The increase would register largely as warmer nighttime and winter temperatures, leading to fewer frosts and longer growing seasons, while increased CO2 will stimulate plant growth and lessen the plants' need for water.''

The site is also running a $1,000 lottery for those who send E-mail to President Clinton about global warming. But the site cautions that ''if the President signs a global warming treaty, you'll need the cash to pay the new energy tax.''

The tone is only slightly more partisan at the Web site for World Climate Report, ''the nation's leading publication covering the breaking news concerning the science and political science of global climate change.''

One of the pressing political science questions featured at this site is whether the Republicans can retake the White House on a platform that includes ''No Car-bon Tax.''

The Web site does disclose that the report is financed by the Western Fuels Association, which ''promotes the importance of cheap electricity -- coal-fired electricity -- to the U.S. economy and its role in air quality improvements.''

But perhaps the most sophisticated voice on global warming in the energy industry remains that of the Mobil Corporation, home of newspaper Op-Ed page advertisements across the country.

In between ads for Mobil Masterpiece Theater and the Mobil Pegasus Prize for Literature (which was last awarded, coincidentally enough, for a book titled ''A God Strolling in the Cool of the Evening''), the company advocates a cautious approach to environmental regulation.

''At Mobil, we do have a point of view on global climate change as well as views on many other issues,'' the site reads. ''And we know they are not always the most popular. But we like the public to know where we stand.''